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EE turned on the UK’s first 5G network today, across London, Edinburgh, Cardiff, Belfast, Birmingham, and Manchester. 5G connectivity is now available in limited parts of these cities, more than a month before rival Vodafone plans to launch its own 5G service. I took to the streets of London today to test out 5G, armed with a OnePlus 7 Pro 5G handset. I’m impressed with the early results. While 5G coverage has been extremely limited with Verizon’s 5G network in the US, it’s a whole different story in London. EE has focused its initial coverage on popular tourist destinations across London, including areas like St Paul’s, Covent Garden, Soho, The Strand, Tower Bridge, and London Bridge. I visited a number of different locations today and performed speed tests against both the 4G and 5G networks of EE. Now, I know these 5G networks aren’t being fully utilized right now, but the average speeds were still a 10x improvement over what I was seeing on 4G. I’d say the average...

Tesla has started taking preorders of Model 3 cars produced at its new Gigafactory in Shanghai, China. Bloomberg reports that the cars, which are available to order exclusively in China, will have a base price of 328,000 yuan ($47,510), 13 percent cheaper than the model imported from the US for a price 377,000 yuan ($54,616). The Model 3s being produced in China are the Standard Plus versions of the vehicle with a range of 460km (286 miles). Tesla says that it expects to start making deliveries from the Shanghai factory in the next six to 10 months. Tesla started making Model 3 deliveries in China back in March. These locally produced cars will allow the company to avoid import duties, which are becoming more of a problem as the Trump administration’s trade war with China intensifies. The company has also said shifting production will allow it to make deliveries faster. CEO Elon Musk described the challenge of shipping its cars globally from the company’s single Nevada factory as...

The trade tension between the United States and China looks set to intensify soon, as the latter country is taking steps to respond to the American ban on doing business with Huawei. Bloomberg reports that China has put preparations in place to restrict exports of rare earth minerals to the US, while also setting up its own “unreliable entities” blacklist for unfavorable foreign companies. At the same time, Japan’s SoftBank has announced it’ll be building its 5G network with equipment from Nokia and Ericsson, snubbing Huawei, which had been a 4G supplier for the large mobile carrier. The rare earths export restriction looks to be an act of saber rattling for now. The leadership in Beijing is signaling that it’s ready and willing to deploy this severe measure, but, according to Bloomberg, that’s only in the event that the trade war between China and the US deepens. Neodymium is one of the most recognizable rare earths, as it’s widely used in magnets. You’ll have seen i...

US president Donald Trump has made Huawei the biggest story in tech right now by banning it from doing business with US companies. Huawei, China’s tech champion, has lost access to Google’s Android and Intel’s chips, and it’s even seen other international partners like ARM and Panasonic bowing to American influence and discontinuing trade. Having previously been on track to becoming the world’s biggest smartphone maker, Huawei is now in such dire straits that the best metaphor its founder could come up with to allay fears is that the company is like a plane with a hole in its side: not doing great, but still up in the air. Bludgeoning Huawei with the ban hammer is, by Trump’s own admission, a negotiating tactic to focus China’s attention on American discontent with the existing trade relationship between the two countries. It lands atop a pile of punitive 25 percent tariffs he’s imposed on many Chinese imports to the US, and a promised further round of such tariffs on...

Asus is celebrating its 30-year anniversary with a special edition laptop. The Asus ZenBook Edition 30 includes a white leather lid cover and an 18-karat rose gold logo that looks a lot like Star Trek’s starfleet insignia. Asus hasn’t gone full leather like HP’s leather Folio tablet / laptop hybrid, but that does mean this latest ZenBook is a traditional laptop through and through. “Every piece of genuine leather is hand selected,” explains Asus chairman Jonney Shih. “Each panel cover is maticulously sewed by a master tailor.” Asus is also supplying special accessories for this leather laptop, including a pearl white mouse and leather sleeve. This isn’t the first time Asus has experimented with leather on laptops, though. Asus first launched its leather-clad S6F laptop in 2006 with the lid and palm rests both covered in leather. Inside the ZenBook Edition 30 there’s Intel’s 8th Gen Core i7 processor, Nvidia’s GeForce MX250 discrete graphics, up to 16GB of RAM...

Huawei founder and CEO Ren Zhengfei has been doing a round of interviews this past week, responding to his company’s placement on a US ban list. In speaking with Bloomberg, he’s made the assertion that he neither expects nor hopes for a retaliation from the Chinese government against the Trump administration’s ban. A resolute Zhengfei says, “That will not happen, first of all. And second of all, if that happens, I’ll be the first to protest.” Notoriety swirls around Huawei’s name in the United States, with American security agencies calling it out as a national security threat and urging consumers away from buying Huawei devices. Other allegations of intellectual property and trade secret theft also mar the company’s reputation, even if hard evidence of material wrongdoing is still difficult to find. President Trump recently asserted that the measures taken by his administration are more of a trade negotiation move against China than a real national security response ...

Some of the world’s greatest artworks are known for their elaborate backstory or complex history, but not many are actively dangerous to those who own them. ‘The Persistence of Chaos’ might be an exception. Created by internet artist Guo O Dong, this piece of art is an ordinary laptop filled with six of the world’s most dangerous pieces of malware. It’s perfectly safe â€" as long you don’t connect to your Wi-Fi or plug in a USB. Speaking to The Verge, artist Guo O Dong says the intention behind the laptop was to make physical the abstract threats posed by the digital world. “We have this fantasy that things that happen in computers can’t actually affect us, but this is absurd,” says Guo. “Weaponized viruses that affect power grids or public infrastructure can cause direct harm.” The six viruses in the laptop (a 10.2-inch Samsung NC10-14GB) were chosen for the magnitude of economic damage they’ve caused. They include the ILOVEYOU virus, a computer bug ...

Over the past week, the US government has taken extreme and unprecedented steps against Huawei, cutting it off from every US partner at the risk of a long-term rupture in trade between the US and China. But while the impact of the order is clear, it’s still not entirely clear why it was put in place. The official explanation, according to the initial executive order, is that Huawei hardware puts the US at risk for espionage. As the order puts it, “foreign adversaries are increasingly creating and exploiting vulnerabilities in information and communications technology and services,” and the “unrestricted acquisition or use” of hardware made by foreign adversaries makes those vulnerabilities worse. It’s a convincing case when it comes to restricting Huawei’s role in network infrastructure, and it’s a case a number of officials have made in that context. But it makes a lot less sense for exported hardware. Why shouldn’t Corning glass or Micron flash memory be sold to...

Facebook plans to launch its cryptocurrency by the first quarter of next year, reports BBC News. The company is expected to reveal more details about the currency this summer, before testing begins later in 2019. The currency, which is being referred to internally as “GlobalCoin,” will reportedly be available in around a dozen countries at launch, where it’s expected to offer people affordable and secure payments without the need for a bank account. The currency will need to overcome numerous technical and regulatory hurdles before it can be launched. According to BBC News, last month Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg met with the Bank of England’s governor Mark Carney to discuss the opportunities and risks of the planned digital currency. However, Facebook might have a harder job on its hands in India, which has taken a hostile attitude towards virtual currencies. India is reported to be a key focus for the new currency, where Facebook hopes it will allow Indian workers abroad to...

In many regions around the world, Huawei phones are easy to come by. They’re sold through carriers, and available in stores. That’s not the case in the US, where Huawei does not officially sell its devices and no carriers offer them. If those things aren’t a deterrent, you’ll likely have to go online to buy one, and even then, the list of retailers that stock Huawei-made devices, including its Honor phones, is shrinking as a result of the US federal government’s recent action against Huawei. The Microsoft Store and Walmart have recently stopped selling Huawei devices, and Adorama, a smaller operation, recently delisted them from showing up via search in its online store. More sites will likely follow suit, either by hiding or completely wiping store pages for Huawei’s phones, tablets, and laptops. RELATED The case against Huawei, explained Still, there are a few places where you can find them. We’ve listed those retailers below, and have included a note on the rang...

The effects of the United States’ Huawei ban continue to grow, with the Chinese hardware company now barred from being a member of the SD Association (the trade group that agrees upon standardized specs for SD and microSD cards). In other words, Huawei is no longer allowed to put official SD or microSD card support in its future phones or laptops, via 9to5Google. The SD Association has confirmed to Android Authority that Huawei’s removal from the group was due to Trump’s executive order, making it the the latest blow to the besieged Chinese company as the result of that ban. MicroSD cards and SD cards will continue to work on existing Huawei hardware, but being barred from the SD Association means that Huawei won’t be able to use the standards on future products. The SD Association is also by no means the first to cut ties: Google, ARM, Intel, Qualcomm, and Broadcom are also among the companies that have stopped working with Huawei due to the ban. The Wi-Fi Alliance (which ...

Facebook is certainly a high-tech company, but it’s not one you would necessarily associate with robots. However, as the firm revealed today, that’s exactly where its researchers are looking next â€" trying to see how experiments in robotics can further its work in AI. This isn’t uncommon for big tech companies. A lot of firms, including Google, Nvidia, and Amazon, use robots as a platform to explore avenues of AI research. Controlling robots is, in many ways, trickier than challenges like playing board games and video games. With these latter tasks, researchers have access to simulated game environments, which allows AI agents to play and learn at accelerated speeds. There’s no such shortcut for training robots. “The great thing about robotics is that it takes place in real time, in the real world,” Facebook’s Antoine Bordes, co-managing director of the company’s artificial intelligence research labs, told Bloomberg News. The research is wide-ranging, and Fa...

First it was a coffee cup, now it’s a bottle of water. Poor Game of Thrones just can’t catch a break. Just a couple of weeks after some eagle-eyed fans discovered a forgotten coffee cup in a Game of Thrones scene, a couple of misplaced water bottles have appeared. The bottles, seen in screenshots below, pop up a few times over the course of several minutes. The first time is at 46:19 on HBO Now, and then a few minutes later. One is tucked just behind Samwell Tarly’s foot in the photo below. Another water bottle can be seen just behind Ser Davos’ chair, in-between him and Gendry. It’s understandable that long, strenuous meetings about the future of Westeros would leave anyone a little parched, but people clearly forgot to throw the bottles off camera once the director yelled “action!” Although it’s not as glaring as the abandoned coffee cup, one would imagine Game of Thrones’ editing team going through the finale with a fine comb. Game of Thrones is the most scrut...

Google has been quietly keeping track of nearly every single online purchase you’ve ever made, thanks to purchase receipts sent to your personal Gmail account, according to a new report today from CNBC. Even stranger: this information is made available to you via a private web tool that’s been active for an indeterminate amount of time. You can go view it here. Because I made my Gmail account nearly a decade ago, my purchase history stretches back as far as 2010, including purchases I made while I was a college student and those through Apple’s App Store, which has been linked to my Gmail account since its inception. It also includes some real-world transactions made using my credit card, thanks to point-of-sale software providers like Square and others that link your credit card number and name to an associated email account to deliver receipts, offer rewards programs, and, in some cases, collect valuable purchase data. “To help you easily view and keep track of your purch...

Fresh off the sledgehammer blow of having its Android license revoked by Google in response to US government demands, Huawei has issued its first, limited response, which leaves more questions open than it answers. In a statement emailed to The Verge, Huawei underscores its contributions to the growth of Android globally â€" which most recently saw the company’s Android phone sales growing by double digits while every other leading smartphone vendor was shrinking or stagnant â€" and reassures current owners of Huawei and (subsidiary brand) Honor phones that they will continue to receive security updates and after-sales service. That promise also covers phones that are already shipped and in stock at stores globally, but no additional promises are made beyond that. Google has already said that owners of Huawei phones will retain their access to the Play Store and continue being able to update their apps. The big thing that’s being written out of their future, however, ar...

Huawei's bad weekend is turning worse as the company’s American suppliers are all falling in line with a US government edict banning them from doing business with the company. Bloomberg now reports that Intel, Qualcomm, and Broadcom, three of the world’s leading chip designers and suppliers, are cutting off their dealings with Huawei, effective immediately. Nikkei reports that German chipmaker Infineon Technologies has also suspended shipments to Huawei, as have US memory chip makers Micron Technology and Western Digital. The chip suspensions follow the earlier news of Google abruptly rescinding Huawei’s Android license and halting its access to Google Play Services and the Play Store, effectively dumping it out of the Android smartphone market and forcing the Chinese company to develop its own version atop the barebone open-source edition of Android. According to Bloomberg’s sources, employees across the major US chipmakers have been informed that their companies will ...

Following the US crackdown on Chinese technology companies, Google has cut off Huawei’s Android license, dealing a huge blow to the besieged phone maker. Reuters first reported the news, and The Verge subsequently confirmed Google’s suspension of business with Huawei with a source familiar with the matter. Reached for comment, a Google spokesperson said only “We are complying with the order and reviewing the implications.” The order, in this case, appears to be the US Commerce Department’s recent decision to place Huawei on the “Entity List,” which as Reuters reports is a list of companies that are unable to buy technology from US companies without government approval. Speaking to Reuters, a Google spokesperson confirmed that “Google Play and the security protections from Google Play Protect will continue to function on existing Huawei devices.” So while existing Huawei phones around the world won’t be immediately impacted by the decision, the future of updates ...

Microsoft and Sony are announcing an unusual partnership today, allowing the two rivals to partner on cloud-based gaming services. “The two companies will explore joint development of future cloud solutions in Microsoft Azure to support their respective game and content-streaming services,” Microsoft said in a statement. Sony’s existing game and content-streaming services will also be powered by Microsoft Azure in the future. Microsoft says “these efforts will also include building better development platforms for the content creator community,” which sounds like both Sony and Microsoft are planning to partner on future services aimed at creators and the gaming community. Both companies say they will “share additional information when available,” but the partnership means Microsoft and Sony will collaborate on cloud gaming. That’s a pretty big deal, and it’s a big loss for Microsoft’s main cloud rival, Amazon. It also means Google, a new gaming rival to Microsof...

There is a lot of 5G hype â€" too much, actually â€" and it’s much more complicated than the transition to 4G was. On top of complicated technological questions about millimeter waves and modems, there’s also geopolitics, trade wars, gigantic lawsuits between tech titans, and empty buildings in Wisconsin. We’re tracking all of those stories on The Verge â€" you can find our 5G coverage right here â€" but if you just want a quick primer on what’s going on now that 5G phones are starting to be sold in stores and the White House is issuing 5G-related orders, read on. 1. SHOULD I BUY A 5G PHONE THIS YEAR? No. Why not? The networks are barely existent, present only in a few cities. Even then, they only work well in certain blocks, and even then, you need line of sight, and even then, you will still have LTE upload speeds. Oh. Well maybe I should buy a 5G phone anyway since I need a phone right now, and I don’t want it to be obsolete if I keep it for ...

What a difference a few weeks can make. Last month, I came to Chicago for the launch of Verizon's 5G network, which is now live both here and in Minneapolis. The inaugural 5G device was the Moto Z3 equipped with Motorola's 5G MotoMod, and my experience â€" and that of many other tech journalists â€" was less than positive: 5G coverage was exceedingly difficult to find. Speeds were noticeably faster than LTE, but not wickedly so. But today marks the release of Samsung's $1,400 Galaxy S10 5G, which will briefly be a Verizon exclusive before moving to other carriers. And now that there's a real, proper 5G phone on its network, Verizon has ramped things up. Coverage remains extremely limited: it varies widely and block by block. But when you find a good spot, it's amazing. I just ran a speed test that crossed 1Gbps, and my mind is frankly a little blown. This is in the real world, where my iPhone XS Max is barely hitting 20Mbps in the same spot. Download...

Seemingly out of nowhere, today has seen the release of a new Pokémon smartphone game called Pokemon Rumble Rush. Initially announced with the name Pokeland back in 2017, the game reappeared today with a new name, and Eurogamer notes that it’s already available on the Australian Google Play Store. An information page for the game says it will eventually also be available for both iOS and Android, and it has been developed by Ambrella, the developer behind the four previous Pokémon Rumble games. We’re starting to lose count of the number of smartphone Pokémon games. Obviously, there’s the Niantic-developed Pokémon Go, which is still going strong almost three years after its initial release, but there are a number of others, including 2017’s Magikarp Jump. Earlier this week, GamesIndustry.biz noted that DeNA, the developer behind Super Mario Run, Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp, and the upcoming Mario Kart Tour, announced that it’s working on a Pokémon mobile game of its ow...

The Supreme Court is letting an antitrust lawsuit against Apple proceed, and it’s rejected Apple's argument that iOS App Store users aren't really its customers. The Supreme Court upheld the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals' decision in Apple v. Pepper, agreeing in a 5-4 decision that Apple app buyers could sue the company for allegedly driving up prices. "Apple's line-drawing does not make a lot of sense, other than as a way to gerrymander Apple out of this and similar lawsuits," wrote Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Apple had claimed that iOS users were technically buying apps from developers, while developers themselves were Apple's App Store customers. According to an earlier legal doctrine known as Illinois Brick, "indirect purchasers" of a product don't have the standing to file antitrust cases. But in today's decision, the Supreme Court determined that this logic doesn’t apply to Apple. The court is careful to note that this is an ...

Folding phones are already being pitched as the next big wave of tech, and whether or not that turns out to be true, the industry has no plans to stop there. Lenovo has just announced what it says is the world's first foldable PC: a prototype ThinkPad that iterates the foldable tech we’ve already seen from phones on a much bigger scale. It’s not just a cool tech demo, either: Lenovo has been developing this for over three years and has plans to launch a finished device in 2020 as part of its premium ThinkPad X1 brand. The goal here is a premium product that will be a laptop-class device, not an accessory or secondary computer like a tablet might be. Cool factor aside, though, why build a folding PC? The answer is largely portability. Conceptually, it's the opposite of what most of the foldable phones out there are trying to do. There, companies like Samsung and Huawei are trying to take a device the size of a regular phone and make them bigger. But the idea behind the f...